Leading cryptocurrencies traded flat on Thursday as President Donald Trump threatened to remove Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell over delays in implementing monetary easing measures.

What Happened: Bitcoin fluctuated between the high $83,000s and early $85,000s, with trading volumes falling by over 25% from the previous day.  

Ethereum reached an intraday high of $1,615.30 but failed to maintain the advance, falling back to the $1,500 range.

The relatively calm trading day saw $126 million liquidated from the cryptocurrency market, with nearly equal amounts of longs and shorts erased.

Over $278 million was liquidated from the market in the last 24 hours, with bullish bets accounting for $160 million.

Interestingly, despite the sideways price action, Bitcoin’s Open Interest grew by 4.45% in the last 24 hours, potentially leading to higher volatility and a breakout in either direction in the coming days.  

More than 54% of Binance futures traders were betting against the leading cryptocurrency, according to the Long/Short ratio.

The market sentiment remained in the "Fear" territory, according to the Crypto Fear and Greed Index.

Top Gainers (24-Hours)

The global cryptocurrency market capitalization stood at $2.67 trillion, following a marginal increase of 0.82% in the last 24 hours.

Stocks were a mixed bag on Thursday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 527.16 points, or 1.33%, to close at 39,142.23. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite slid 0.13% to end at 16,286.45.

The lone bright spot was the S&P 500, which rose 0.13% to 5,282.70 at the session’s close.

The moves came after Trump threatened to dismiss Powell if rate cuts were not implemented soon, following the Fed Chair’s warning the day before about tariff-fueled inflation concerns.

A Fed chair can only be removed for cause, historically interpreted as misconduct or incapacity, not policy disagreements.

The New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq will both be closed on Good Friday.

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Analyst Notes: Popular blockchain analytics firm Glassnode stated that while Bitcoin’s realized capitalization, or the value of each coin depending on the price it was last moved, was at an all-time high, monthly growth had slowed to 0.9%.

"This indicates that while capital inflows remain positive, investor appetite is softening – signaling continued risk-off sentiment," Glassnode added.

Widely followed cryptocurrency analyst Rekt Capital highlighted Bitcoin’s climb above the downward trendline but below the 50-day exponential moving average.

"BTC needs to daily close above green resistance [$85,049] & retest it as support to break out beyond here," the analyst projected.

Photo: Antonio Gravante on Shutterstock.com

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